The Office of Institutional Compliance announced last week the creation of a new web portal to report suspected misconduct.

The website will provide a second option for students, faculty and staff to report misconduct besides the other method, a hotline.

The added option comes after an academic quarter that saw considerable student backlash to the university’s handling of the sexual assault issue. Director of Compliance and Risk Management Emily Opalski, however, said that there is no connection between the changes and the protests.

“DePaul recently switched to a new vendor that offers a web-reporting tool, and DePaul adopted it to give our community more reporting options,” Opalski said.

The vendor, EthicsPoint, controls the website. According to its website, the company is committed “to ensure that you can communicate issues and concerns associated with unethical or illegal activities safely and honestly with an organization’s management or the board of directors while maintaining confidentiality.”

When there is a new report, “the vendor informs Compliance and Risk Management,” Opalski said. “Compliance and Risk Management then shares the report with a team of appropriate individuals, and a decision is made about how to proceed.”

According to Opalski, about 10 reports a year is typical for DePaul through the hotline with allegations of fraud, conflict of interest, and misuse of university property most commonly being reported.

“As other software tools become available in the future, DePaul will review them to assess whether they would be appropriate additions to our portfolio of both compliance and reporting tools,” Opalski said.